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Tag: Neil Boorman

I was chatting to someone the other day about whatever had happened to Neil Boorman’s book – Bonfire of the Brands. As I understand it, it’s the process and results of his self-inflicted experiment to give up all branded stuff.

Out-of-the-blue-ish I got a mail today and it appears that his book is coming out very soon. As someone who has a totally 2-faced view of my own consumption of brands I’m looking forward to reading it.

On a similar not I just finished ‘I’m not buying it‘ by Judith Levine, which is about one couple’s quest to give up shopping for a year. An interesting read that made me question just what would happen to me if I gave up buying things. I don’t think I could do it though.

A scaled down, brand-free, version like Neil’s is probably more in line with what I could manage. I’m still too much of an objectophile to give up everything – although when you start questioning everything you soon realise that almost everything we buy carries some brand or another (even the ‘branded shirts‘ that clubs are objecting to these days). I’m interested to see how someone else has managed to get through the minefield, or not.

Neil Boorman (ex-editor of ex-Sleazenation, Shorditch Twat and other titles I’m sure) is writing a book called: Bonfire Of The Brands

As part of his experience he’s burning all of his branded goods in a big bonfire as part of re-evaluating his lifestyle. If you’re thinking ‘Oh no! Another Adbuster/No-Logoist’, don’t. You can tell that Neil has a lot of love for brands and that he’s going to find it quite hard to do this. In his own words:

Brands are wealth creators; they provide employment across the globe, and ultimately they make our lives infinitely more comfortable. So I have been keen to avoid the No Logo supporters’ calls to ‘bring it all down’. Yes, I am burning all my own branded possessions, and I will be attempting to live my new life brand-free, but the book is really an experiment to see if it is actually possible to disconnect from branded consumerism.

The blog he’s running is really interesting. His view of the world seems to be considered and realistic (in spite of wanting to burn Â£1,000s worth of stuff).